Harper is brought to Louisiana bayou country to help out an old girlfriend who is worried that her husband will find out that she is cheating on him. What is more, he finds himself caught in a power struggle between the matriarch of the family and a greedy oil baron, who wants her property. Poor Harper! Things are not as straight-forward as they initially appeared. A big-city private detective travels to the Deep South to help out an old girlfriend who is worried that her husband will find out that she is cheating on him. Paul Newman and New Orleans–normally, two of my favorites. The Ross McDonald mystery the movie is based on is a classic. But I was disappointed by this film. I did enjoy seeing Paul Newman dripping wet (after swimming with swim trunks on, after shower with towel on, after being nearly drowned with boxers on) and roughing up some characters. Melanie Griffith's seductive teenager was also interesting to watch. Murray Hamilton, who played Kilbourne, was an amusing villain, but then I'm usually amused by villains. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to keep my complete attention, and I lost the (convoluted) plot. Time would have been better spent rewatching Cool Hand Luke, The Sting, or Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Where Harper was jazzy, amped up for its day and often dark humored in its intrigue and violence, this sequel has more of a laid-back and ultimately melancholy tone. The humor is still there, but the dysfunctional family theme that produced edgy laughs in the earlier film cuts deeper here.<br/><br/>Newman looks great and is as effortlessly effective as ever as he prowls Cajun Country, at the behest of onetime flame Joanne Woodward, in search of a blackmail source that quickly turns into much more. Filmed all over South Louisiana, including a mansion shot here in Baton Rouge, it gets the local flavor down pretty well.<br/><br/>Dismissed as draggy even in its day, and certainly so in the age raised on the newspaper ad quote "A Thrill Ride!!!", it's a thoughtful, well acted addition to the private eye genre, with Melanie Griffith coming out the gate full force as a troublesome nymphet (an interesting predatory flip-side to the victimized variation seen later the same year in the superb Night Moves.)<br/><br/>Hopefully a widescreen DVD will one day soon afford its excellent Panavision photography to be seen for the first time in 25 years. A confusing and not very exciting private eye caper.
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372 weeks ago